Cheapest/Easiest Tiki Drink for a Large Party

I am looking for an inexpensive, somewhat easy-to-make punch-style drink that I can serve at a Halloween party with 20 people or so.

These people will probably not appreciate a well-mixed synergy of a Tiki drink and simply want to get drunk. (Let's call a spade a spade here.)

What would you guys make in this situation?

I'm leaning toward a Sidewinder's Fang with the idea that I can pre-mix orange juice, lime juice, and passion fruit syrup in equal quantities. I could then mix it with some gold rum (Cruzan Dark) and perhaps some dark rum (Myers). Top with club soda in a large punch bowl filled with cracked/crushed ice.

Planter's Punch and Shark's Tooth also seem like they'd be easy to make, although the dark rum will cost a small premium. (Read: Cruzan Dark is cheap.)

Any thoughts? Ideas?

Thanks in advance!

just add 151 - done deal - drunk!

I serve (a lot of) Painkillers in a hollowed out pumpkin (the little ones).

I also make a bloody eyeball garnish from a lychee fruit stuffed with raspberry/strawberry jam and a blueberry (for the iris).

That Lychee idea is fantastic!

I am worried about the coconut cream separating. Have you ever had any problems with this?

Blood of the Kapu Tiki is another one that is easy and quick. And name appropriate for the occasion.

On 2009-09-29 14:18, loneranger84 wrote:
That Lychee idea is fantastic!

I am worried about the coconut cream separating. Have you ever had any problems with this?

Generally no. Are you using something like CocoLopez or RealCoco? Or real home-made fresh kind of stuff?

Fresh home-made stuff may separate, possibly even curdle from the citrus, otherwise your shouldn't have any issues.

On 2009-09-29 14:18, loneranger84 wrote:
That Lychee idea is fantastic!

I am worried about the coconut cream separating. Have you ever had any problems with this?

Not with Lopez. Add more booze too. Coruba or Meyers will work fine for the living dead.

I would use Coco Lopez.

I'll look into Blood of the Kapu Tiki.
(Incidentally, I came across another time you recommended this drink on another forum, Chip and Andy.)

Painkillers sound easy and would also be delicious.

Thanks for all of the responses (so far)!

On 2009-09-29 16:46, loneranger84 wrote:
(Incidentally, I came across another time you recommended this drink on another forum, Chip and Andy.)

Wasn't me! It was my evil twin!

Except......

I am the evil twin.

So who was it that was recommending the Blood of the Kapu Tiki.... (insert creepy organ music here)

(start fog machine, ready camera 2)

(Someone go and make sure Old Man Witherspoon is ready)

I served Mai Tais by the pitcher at my last party. Granted, I cut back on the ingredients a bit, due to budgetary consideration; I used Bols Curacao instead of Senior, St. James Amber instead of La Favourite Vieux (I did use Appleton X/V though) and Fee's Orgeat instead of Routin 1883. They tasted absolutely great for a party atmosphere were a huge hit with my guests!

Well, for anyone that cares, the cheapest option was a botched version of the Shark's Tooth.

I am using a dark amber rum (Flor de Cana Gold) as the sole rum in the drink (rather than a Barbados rum and an aged Jamaican rum.)

Plus it's so much cheaper than the other options that I can splurge on some maraschino cherries for garnish (and the yummy syrup) while keeping it under $30. =)

[ Edited by: loneranger84 2009-09-30 13:53 ]

Bols Curacao!? You must've hated these people. :wink:
I considered Mai Tais since it's a pretty minimalistic drink, but I want to get away with having only one kind of alcohol in there if possible.
(i.e. I can splurge a good quality amber rum instead of buying mediocre rum and curacao.)

I'm liking this Blood of the Kapu Tiki. I love that it calls for Pernod because I have some Absinthe sitting around that I could use.
Though a Doctor Funk would be a bit easier and is more what I'm looking for.
(i.e. 1 fruit juice, not 3. Especially in case I feel like squeezing it fresh, which I might.)

Tiki+ is an awesome iPhone application for any iPhone owners BTW. It's not complete by any means, but there's a lot of recipes here!

Scorpion Bowls are usually crowd-pleasers, just be sure to have a plastic covering for your bathroom floor to easily pick up the upchuck.

Suffering Bastards and Dark 'n' Stormys are also pretty simple and cheap to make for a crowd since you just build the cocktails in glasses rather than mess with blenders.

For a recent party we threw, I made two "bulk" cocktails: Mai Tai and Blue Hawaiian (not Blue Hawaii). Both big crowd pleasers.

Interestingly enough, almost to a person the men wanted Mai Tais and the women wanted Blue Hawaiians.

Blue Hawaiian would only cost me a couple more dollars to make than the Shark's Tooth. I'm still considering it.

My only qualm about the Shark's Tooth is that with 8 oz. of rum to 6 oz. of "mixer", it's probably going to be a strong drink.

Good thing I've got a month to test all these different drinks out. =)

[ Edited by: loneranger84 2009-10-01 10:09 ]

Personal experience says the Miehana recipe scales well by the pitcher. I have no reason to doubt it's ability to scale to a punchbowl.

kevin

Just wondering if anyone had any new ideas for a punch style drink for about 20 people. this is for Halloween but doesn't have to be theme oriented.
Oh and easy to make yes but doesn't have to be a cheap drink.

[ Edited by: hiltiki 2013-10-24 08:31 ]

I'm tossing in a suggestion based on some testing done last night at my home bar with a friend. He is also looking for something inexpensive and tasty to serve for a large group coming to his home in the next few weeks.

The "Fink Bomb" from Frankie's Tiki Room is relatively simple and flavorful. It is made with pineapple juice, Midori melon liqueur, coconut rum, and a gold rum float over ice. We took a road trip and found three versions of melon liqueur at Total Wine -- Midori $20, DeKuyper $12, and another low-end brand for $7. We decided to test with my Midori and also bought a bottle of the $7 liqueur. We made two cocktails and for both we used Cruzan coconut rum (very reasonable at around $13/bottle) along with Diplomatico gold rum for the float and swapped out only the melon liqueur.

Our conclusions were:

1. The low-end melon rum was sweeter and not as rich and thick as Midori, but we thought it would work well for non-experienced drinkers. The Cruzan coconut offered a good combination of flavor and low price and worked very well. The Diplomatico could be replaced by another less-expensive gold rum, but we didn't have the guts to go too cheap all the way around. The pineapple juice came from a Dole can and held up well.
2. There is NO SHAKING and NO GARNISH involved in making the drink. Add ice, then all the liquid ingredients. It tends to "layer" and looks attractive on its own. So this was very low-effort cocktail with a pleasant pineapple/coconut/melon blend.

Better ingredients yield better taste and texture, but this is definitely EASY. And it's relatively INEXPENSIVE if you buy lower-end melon liqueur and low-end gold rum.

The recipe is in the book "Liquid Vacation" from Frankie's Tiki Room.

Tiare at A Mountain of Crushed Ice just posted a Wray and Nephew rum pumch from the recent UK Rum Festival (see link) that looks worthwhile. I'm going to spin this up over the weekend for sure, though I will be doubling the amount of rum. It's similar to a homespun Jamaican House Party Punch I am very fond of.

http://www.amountainofcrushedice.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Rumfest-2013-JWray-recipes1.jpg

Fog cutters - make it to the right strenght & let people add their own ice

You might want to be careful using the Wray & Nephew around "civilians". It has a taste that newbies might not like.

On 2012-10-04 11:29, Hale Tiki wrote:
Official Appleton Estates Rum Punch:

In a punch bowl, combine
1-750ml Appleton Estate V/X
1-750ml Coruba dark Jamaican rum
1-750ml Wray & Nephew white overproof rum
2L orange juice
2L pineapple juice
1 cup lime juice
1/2 cup grenadine and several dashes of Angostura bitters
Stir to mix and add a block of ice to chill. Serve in punch cups and garnish with fresh fruit.

Here is my Kraken Killer recipe which is very easy to scale up

On 2013-03-16 21:26, Atomic Tiki Punk wrote:
Here is my "Kraken Killer" recipe
I think this is better then the classic "Painkiller" which I am still a big fan of.

In a Cocktail Shaker, half filled with ice

2 oz. Kraken Rum
1 oz. Cruzan Coconut Rum
1 oz. Monin Coconut Syrup (I like this much better then Coco Lopez, which is lumpy & has a chalky after taste to it)
4 oz. Pineapple Juice
1 oz. Orange Juice

Give it a good shaking, pour into a tall glass or mug of your choice with more ice
and dust with Nutmeg.

Now enjoy the hell out of it!
Please let me know if you prefer this over the classic recipe, most people I serve this to, do....

[ Edited by: Atomic Tiki Punk 2013-03-16 21:29 ]

That Appleton Estates Rum Punch that Hale Tiki shared is very good.

Tried the J Wray Reggae Punch tonight made to recipe specs and it was good but needs to be tweaked cor balance. Used up all my Wray a d Nephew but when I get some more I will try this one again with 1.5x the rum and 0.75x the Jamaican strawberry syrup.

Thank you all so much for great ideas. I will try to make some of these drinks and decide.

When I have a decent sized group, I mix a big batch of Rum Barrels. I use Myers's instead of Demerara. Everyone likes it, it is not hard to measure. It is a big drink that you can serve in smaller glasses full of ice and make it last longer. It improves with better ingredients, but it perfectly good off the shelf. Do get decent lime juice like the not from concentrate organic bottled if you don't want to fresh squeeze.

It has the classic simple/complex feature. You can enjoy it thoughtlessly and it is good, or you can tell them it has 10 ingredients and they can think about it and taste the depth.

On 2013-10-29 06:28, Swanky wrote:
When I have a decent sized group, I mix a big batch of Rum Barrels. I use Myers's instead of Demerara.

Good suggestion, Swanky!

Swanky - which Rum Barrel recipe? I recall a few variations

Don's I use Tiki+ a lot and it is there too.

It's a 9 oz. drink, which is pretty huge compared to most. It is basically double a normal recipe and is less than 50% booze, which again, isn't too bad for a Tiki drink. Ice cubes can help it to melt and dilute a bit faster to help that as well.

Mai-Kai Memories Series Custom ceramic mugs!

[ Edited by: Swanky 2013-10-29 08:54 ]

Swanky,

It's funny but your right. Newbies love Meyers just as much as a great aged El Dorado.

I never waste the good stuff on Squares anymore.

-Longboard

Well I decided to make ATP's Kraken Killer because it was fairly easy to make. I called it Atomic Tiki Punch because I didn't use Kraken rum. It was a great success everyone loved it. Thank you ATP for a tasty drink recipe. I made a batch for about 20 or so people, but we had to make more, they just couldn't get enough. :)

[ Edited by: hiltiki 2013-11-02 19:02 ]

Glad to hear you like it! hope the party was a blow out.

Having some people over tonight. I found this recipe somewhere on the net long time ago. It is budget oriented since I will be using Kraken rum.

Dirtnapple

1/2 oz lime juice
1/2 oz passion fruit syrup, (I'm using Monin, I'm too lazy to make my own or to make
half frozen Goya concentrate and half sugar syrup)
2 oz pineapple juice
1 oz coconut rum (Cruzan)
1 oz Amber rum (Kraken)
(I added 1/2 oz of coconut milk only because I like the color and the taste of it)

Very refreshing and tasty. I know my guests will love this one.
I am serving them in my vintage TV coconut mugs. I have collected so many in the last 10 years I have enough for everyone.

I made the below twice over the Turkey day weekend to a great reception...couldn't be any easier, but still tastes pretty sophisticated. Fine to get 7-10 folks buzzed, simple to bump up.

[From David Wondrich]"pirate-style rum punch." All you need to do: stir 3/4 cup of demerara or turbinado sugar ("Sugar in the Raw") and 1 cup of water over low heat until the sugar has dissolved. Let cool for 15 minutes. Put the syrup in a 3-quart bowl or pitcher and stir in 3/4 cup of fresh-squeezed lime juice. Add 1 750-ml bottle of the funkiest rum you can get (some examples: Smith & Cross; Myers's; a 50-50 blend of Lemon Hart 151 or Wray & Nephew White Overproof and Gosling's Black Seal). Stir. Add 3 cups cold water and a whole lot of ice. Stir again, grate fresh nutmeg over the top, and then, Wondrich says, you're ready to "set sail for the Spanish Main."

You can drink arkay rum it s an alcohol free liquors rum , vodka and more
Sheers....

On 2013-12-12 14:36, sosylvie wrote:
You can drink arkay rum it s an alcohol free liquors rum , vodka and more
Sheers....

Hey sosylvie,

How'd you like a nice Hawaiian Punch? :wink:

No booze in the booze, means it ain't booze!

Booze is the only answer!

I have made the "Reverb Crash" for a selected group of 125 people at a fund-raiser.
Easy to make in quantity: 4 oz. White grapefruit juice, 1.5 oz. passion fruit syrup (Make your own, it's easy), 1 TBS orgeat. 1 0z each white and dark rum (the dark being Myers Jamaican). Multiply the ingredients by the number of drinks you wish to make. Serve in a double old Fashioned glass garnished with a mint sprig. It's a tasty and refreshing drink. You can also make the original "Hurricane" in quantity; see the Bum's recipe as it is very easy to make in quantity, but you MUST serve it in a Hurricane glass!

I bet you feel more like you do now now than you did when you came in.

GENT

[ Edited by: GentleHangman 2013-12-12 15:46 ]

I used the Rum Tropical recipe from Remixed for my birthday. Rum, Pineapple, Lime, and Falernum (which adds the "can't put my finger on it" flavor). The falernum ups the price but you only use 2 oz. If you prorate the cost of falernum it came out to about $25 for 50 drinks. Not bad.

gabbahey

[ Edited by: gabbahey 2013-12-13 10:44 ]